My Lady Vampire - Book Three (29 page)

With a start he awoke, almost expecting to find St. Chesswell still sitting and chatting next to him. Instead there was an old volume there, and Sidney awkwardly heaved himself into a sitting position.

There was a message for him in the text and he couldn’t wait to find out what it was.

The pages were fragile, the lettering old-fashioned and blurred in places, and it appeared to be another grimoire, but from where or when Sidney could not immediately guess.

He simply turned to Chapter Three.

And stanza fourteen…

“
To Free The Mayde, The Mayker Muft be Un-Mayde
.”

His brow wrinkled as he considered the words, but his fuddled and exhausted brain could make no sense of them. He was too tired, and in too much pain to think clearly. The message would simply have to wait.

He sighed. It would seem that their task was unfinished. So much horror, innocent lives lost, and still the evil survived.

Sidney leaned back and closed his eyes. That was a fight they would continue on the morrow. And with their new knowledge, they had a better chance of success.

For now, he simply wanted to rest and enjoy the warmth of knowing his own love hadn’t really left him for good. She had passed away, but he knew he’d see her again, some place and some time otherwhere.

There were some mysteries not meant to be known by mortals. That was one of them.

Love
, however--well that was a mystery that defied all efforts to defeat it.

It would never,
ever
, be vanquished.

Epilogue

The sun was setting over London, casting its final rays through the smog and haze that drifted over the capital city.

A man stirred, lazily stretching, then stilling as his leg met warm flesh.

Sir Nicholas Blaine realized he was not alone.

He quietly moved, sliding from the bed with scarcely a whisper of cloth to mark his passage. Staring around him, the bile of disgust rose in his throat.

A whore lay snoring on the pillow, her snuffles a soft accompaniment to the noise from outside the stew where they’d lain. The room was sparsely furnished, filthy, and Nick knew at that moment he could sink no further.

This was the end.

His scientific brilliance had faded, his fortune had dissipated long ago, and his very existence had withered into the occasional nocturnal foray to sate his appetite–and his strange sexual desires.

He was cursed, doomed to wander the nights--a foul presence unfit to breathe the air of his homeland. Simply because he’d succumbed to the lures of one incredibly beautiful redhead. They’d fucked and slept and fucked once more.

It had been a night of vivid and violent sex, a night that had reshaped his thoughts about all things erotic, even while it was reshaping his destiny.

He hadn’t known that, of course, until he’d tried to rise the following day, only to learn what he now was. A horror, an abomination, a walking ghost of his former self.

And all because of one spontaneous trip--to a charmingly elegant and beautiful European estate called Rogaška.

As he dressed he felt a vague presence behind him. He prayed once more that it was not her.

“
There are others like you. Find them
.”

He spun on his heel, but there was no one there. Blinking, he tried again to relax his mind, a trick he’d begun to practice when he’d discovered that occasionally he could sense--
something
. Most often it would be the lust in whomever he was fucking at the time, but now…

“
Go south
.”

The voice was clear as a bell, and yet the room bore no traces of another, no sign that anyone was there. Least of all
her
.

Was it a vision? Or was it the result of his disordered brain finally breaking down into what he’d always feared--the depths of insanity?

His gaze caught a scrap of newspaper, torn to wrap some unspeakable piece of offal that the woman had probably shared with her colleagues. It was from several weeks ago, and he scraped off the grease to read the headline beneath.

“
Curse of the Chyne claims a New Victim! Horrid Death in Hampshire
!”

There was a short and lurid paragraph following, detailing the passing of one Arthur Byerly who had met his end in a particularly unpleasant fashion.

Nick read the piece through, frustrated that the final sentences had been ripped away. But there was enough information hidden between the exaggerations. Enough to tell him that perhaps he should indeed follow the voice’s instructions and head south.

To Hampshire.

And this strangely named, allegedly cursed place--
St. Chesswell’s Chyne
…

TO BE CONTINUED…

###

As you can see, this is only the beginning of the battle between good and evil - between the residents of St. Chesswell’s Chyne and the viciously evil, flame-haired vampire, Thérèse.

The second volume of this series introduces Nick Blaine, a man who - like Adrian - found himself alone with his lusts and a certain redhead. Now he’s paying the price. But salvation lies ahead for Nick, as does hope…something he’s given up on in the intervening years. It’s a rocky road, of course, but he won’t be traveling alone any more…

Please look for
My Lady Vampire, Book Two,
the adventures of Nick Blaine and his unlikely lady.

To complete this series, and see if good can truly kick evil firmly in the rear end, don’t miss
My Lady Vampire, Book Three--
the story of Thérèse and how she became what she is. Can she be redeemed? Read this book and find out!

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www.saharakelly.com
. You'll find links to my latest releases, both eBook and print, along with some other odds and ends.

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I hope you'll find something to entertain and amuse you and that all your reading experiences will bring you joy.

With best wishes --- Sahara Kelly